By William Fisher
From Washington this week comes proof that high-profile individuals can sometimes force the Bush Administration to reverse some of its anti-human rights policies.
The high-profile individual is Prof. Shirin Ebadi, the Iranian dissident who was the first Muslim woman to win the Nobel Prize. This is the story of how she and her colleagues got the US Treasury Department to stop a certain train wreck.
Prof. Ebadi was told she couldn’t publish her memoirs in the United States because of regulations that prohibit ‘trading with the enemy’. “The enemy”, in Prof. Ebadi’s case, is Iran, against whom the US currently has sanctions. The Trading With The Enemy Act (TWTE), passed in 1917, allows the president to bar transactions during times of war or national emergency. Though the law has been amended to exempt publishers, the Treasury Department continued to rule it illegal “to enhance the value of anything created in Iran without permission” -- including books.
The Department suggested Prof. Ebadi apply for a special license. But instead, Prof. Ebadi and her agent joined a lawsuit filed a month earlier against the Treasury Department by several American organizations representing publishers, editors and translators. These organizations had conducted fruitless negations for more than a year with Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC), which administers the TWTE regulations. Prof. Ebadi’s book is described as an effort to "help correct Western stereotypes of Islam, especially the image of Muslim women as docile, forlorn creatures." The TWTE regulations currently apply to countries against which the US has sanctions – Iran, Sudan and Cuba.
The lawsuit said, “At a time when the US calls for citizens of other countries to follow the example of American democracy, preventing writers in certain countries from reaching the American public sends exactly the wrong message. Writers in Iran, Cuba and Sudan cannot publish freely in their own countries. It is a tragic and dangerous irony that Americans may not freely publish the works of those writers here, either.”
“We seek to overturn the regulations on what Americans can and cannot read in the United States”, Prof. Ebadi wrote in “The New York Times” (November 16) about the lawsuit. The suit was filed by the PEN American Center, the Association of American Publishers Professional and Scholarly Publishing division (AAP/PSP), the Association of American University Presses (AAUP), and Arcade Publishing. Arcade is the publisher of PEN’s “Anthology of Iranian Literature”. PEN is a writers’ advocacy group.
Prof. Ebadi wrote that she “was surprised and angered when I learned that regulations in the United States make it nearly impossible for me to write a book for Americans. Despite federal laws that say that American trade embargoes may not restrict the free flow of information, the Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Assets Control continues to regulate the import of books from Iran, Cuba and other countries. In order to skirt the laws protecting the flow of information, the government prohibits publishing ‘materials not fully created and in existence’. Therefore, I could publish my memoir in the United States, but it would be illegal for an American literary agent, publisher, editor or translator to help me.” Rule-breakers are subject to prison sentences of up to 10 years or fines of up to $1,000,000.
Human rights, she said, “including the freedom to read whatever one wishes, are universal values that transcend national boundaries. Therefore, just as I take on court cases in Tehran to defend others' rights, so must I follow my conscience and take on a lawsuit in the United States to defend my own rights and the rights of Americans.”
The organizations asked the court to strike down OFAC regulations that require publishers, writers, and translators to seek a license from the government to perform the routine services necessary to publish foreign literature in the United States.
Those rulings and the regulations they interpret mandate that Americans may not publish work not already published in embargoed countries, promote or market the work, nor provide vaguely defined "artistic or substantive alterations or enhancements" to the work.
Prof. Ebadi and her colleagues charged that the regulations violate both the intention of Congress, articulated in the 1989 Berman Amendment, and the 1994 Free Trade in Ideas Act, which exempts transactions involving "information and informational materials" from embargoed countries, as well as the First Amendment to the US Constitution. The author of the Berman Amendment is Congressman Howard Berman, Democrat of California, who has long been an advocate for the free flow of information from embargoed nations.
In March, Rep. Berman wrote the Treasury Department to criticize its “narrow and misguided interpretation of the law”. He added: “I fail to see how this serves the interests of the United States in any way, shape or form.”
PEN, the AAP/PSP, AAUP, and Arcade contended that OFAC's regulations overreached the office's statutory authority and endangered US citizens' constitutional rights.
Last week, the Treasury Department abruptly reversed its interpretation of the TWTE Act, to largely exempt writers, publishers, editors, translators and literary agents from the regulations governing the publication of informational materials, including medical and scientific publications as well as books, from countries subject to US trade embargoes.
Edward Davis, whose law firm represents the publishing organizations as well as PEN, called the Treasury Department’s decision “a very encouraging first step toward restoring the freedom of expression”, but cautioned that “the government has not yet undone all the restrictions imposed.” He told IPS, “Prof. Ebadi’s reputation and notoriety undoubtedly played a role in getting the government to change its rules.” Davis’s law firm, Davis, Wright, Tremaine, has not yet withdrawn the lawsuit.
There is an ironic twist to the Ebadi story. At the same time the Treasury Department was denying Prof. Ebadi the right to publish her book, the US State Department – which is reportedly in charge of ‘winning the hearts and minds’ of people who live under repressive, authoritarian regimes – was lauding her on its website as one of Iran’s “Voices Struggling To Be Heard.”
The website notes that she was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2003 “for her life-long campaign to protect vulnerable and persecuted groups within Iranian society.” And it quotes the citation from the Norwegian Nobel Committee: “As a lawyer, judge, lecturer, writer and activist, she has spoken out clearly and strongly in her country, Iran and far beyond.”
The State Department website goes on to explain, “Since being forced from her position as the president of the city court of Tehran, she has used her legal expertise to promote and protect some of the most basic and necessary human rights…. she has provided legal representation to many activists who are the targets of government harassment because of dissident opinions and democracy promotion. She has courageously fought for equitable and just treatment for women in Iranian society, and she has also helped to organize efforts to publicize and alleviate the harsh conditions of ‘street children’ in Iran.”
Prof. Ebadi, a former judge who was forced by the Iranian regime to step down from the bench, is now a law professor at the University of Tehran. In her “New York Times” op-ed, Prof. Ebadi wrote, “I cannot publish my memoir in Iran. The book would either be banned altogether or censored to such an extent that it would be rendered useless. Publishing my book in the United States would involve risk and repercussions for me back in Iran. I believe, however, that the message of the book is so important that I will happily accept the risk and its possible consequences.”
The State Department website notes that in 2000 Prof. Ebadi “was arrested and accused of distributing a videotape that implicated prominent hard-line leaders of instigating attacks against advocates of reform. She received a suspended sentence and a professional ban. She was then detained after attending a conference in Berlin on the Iranian reform movement.”
It says she also provided legal representation for “highly politicized and sensitive cases” such as the students killed during the 1999 Tehran University protests by vigilante groups operating under the influence of hard-line clerics, and two prominent political activists who were stabbed to death in 1998 by “rogue” elements within the Intelligence Ministry.
Even President Bush lauds Prof. Ebadi. In Iran, he says, “the demand for democracy is strong and broad as we saw when thousands gathered to welcome home Shirin Ebadi…The regime in Tehran must heed the democratic demands of the Iranian people, or lose its last claim to legitimacy."
.
Sunday, December 19, 2004
Wednesday, December 15, 2004
LETTER FROM IRAQ
By William Fisher
One of my dearest friends is the director of a major project in Iraq funded by the US Agency for International Development (USAID). She emails me periodically to report on the situation there. Below is her communiqué from December 15.
“I have not been to Baghdad for almost two months. I am running this project through email and telephone, and from time to time my colleagues from Baghdad come to see me. They report, as does our security group there, that things are bad, lawless in some areas, and indeed lots of people are getting killed. It is hard sometimes to distinguish between insurgency and criminality. Baghdad has always bounced back - what's a car bomb or two? But the bounce these days is not as high and is slower in coming. The city is much quieter, though that could be from the lack of gasoline and electricity.
“There is a relative news blackout, which says to me that the good guys are really kicking butt or really getting their butts kicked. I suspect it is the former, though not uniformly so. Mosul is a mess, fighting continues in Fallujah, the two triangles (Sunni and death) just keep rumbling on, and the security reports are uneven in their forecasts and assessments. The best news is that large numbers of parties, include the biggest amongst the Sunnis have decided to contest the election. My Iraqi friends and colleagues are unambiguously excited about the elections, and while there is not the type of political debate that we have the US, I have a feeling that this election is going to more successful than one would assume based on what the situation looks like now.
“Yesterday, I made my first, and I hope it will be my only trip to pay my condolences to the widow of one of my employees. One of my guards, while off-duty, traveled to Mosul to purchase building material for construction of a new house. He was with a group of cousins and brothers. The group was approached by masked gunmen who inspected their IDs one by one. The gunmen found my guard's badge, so he was shot in the arm and dragged away. The cousins and brothers fled. A few days later my guard's brother found him lying dead in a street in Mosul. His name was Saed. His funeral was a few days ago and my deputy attended (as you know, funerals are only
for men).
“How pathetic the situation is. Saed's widow is but a girl, no more than 17 or 18 years old, with two little kids, a boy and girl. We sat on a carpeted floor, bare but for a kerosene heater in the center. I was offered a cup of sugary tea. Her brother-in-law, a high ranking Iraqi army officer, sat with us, as did Ahmed my security guy. The brother-in-law did what little talking there was. He described his brother as loyal and strong, dedicated to his family and tribe. Ahmed made a collection from the project staff, and accumulated a wild looking stack of multicolored Iraqi notes and US dollars. We had a goal of giving him his annual salary, $5000, and we succeeded with a little help from the project slush fund. I handed this to the girl without ceremony, and she accepted with but a hint of gratitude.The gesture made much more impact on the officer and the others in the village who came to witness the goings-on. We also offered to pay to finish the house that Saed was building. The brother-in-law officer assured me that the girl will be taken care of, in fact, she will probably become a wife of another brother.
“And on this same day, Paul Bremer got his Presidential Medal of Honor,along with (General Tommy ) Franks and (former CIA chief George) Tenet. Instead of receiving medals they should be the ones attending the funerals and handing over paltry sums to innocent Iraqis. This is why I am so angry. None of this had to happen.”
There is little one can add to this kind of crie de couer. Except to underline my friend’s last sentence: “None of this had to happen.” The list of those who should be held accountable is too long to publish here. But, as Harry Truman famously remarked, “The buck stops here” – which means George W. Bush.
One of my dearest friends is the director of a major project in Iraq funded by the US Agency for International Development (USAID). She emails me periodically to report on the situation there. Below is her communiqué from December 15.
“I have not been to Baghdad for almost two months. I am running this project through email and telephone, and from time to time my colleagues from Baghdad come to see me. They report, as does our security group there, that things are bad, lawless in some areas, and indeed lots of people are getting killed. It is hard sometimes to distinguish between insurgency and criminality. Baghdad has always bounced back - what's a car bomb or two? But the bounce these days is not as high and is slower in coming. The city is much quieter, though that could be from the lack of gasoline and electricity.
“There is a relative news blackout, which says to me that the good guys are really kicking butt or really getting their butts kicked. I suspect it is the former, though not uniformly so. Mosul is a mess, fighting continues in Fallujah, the two triangles (Sunni and death) just keep rumbling on, and the security reports are uneven in their forecasts and assessments. The best news is that large numbers of parties, include the biggest amongst the Sunnis have decided to contest the election. My Iraqi friends and colleagues are unambiguously excited about the elections, and while there is not the type of political debate that we have the US, I have a feeling that this election is going to more successful than one would assume based on what the situation looks like now.
“Yesterday, I made my first, and I hope it will be my only trip to pay my condolences to the widow of one of my employees. One of my guards, while off-duty, traveled to Mosul to purchase building material for construction of a new house. He was with a group of cousins and brothers. The group was approached by masked gunmen who inspected their IDs one by one. The gunmen found my guard's badge, so he was shot in the arm and dragged away. The cousins and brothers fled. A few days later my guard's brother found him lying dead in a street in Mosul. His name was Saed. His funeral was a few days ago and my deputy attended (as you know, funerals are only
for men).
“How pathetic the situation is. Saed's widow is but a girl, no more than 17 or 18 years old, with two little kids, a boy and girl. We sat on a carpeted floor, bare but for a kerosene heater in the center. I was offered a cup of sugary tea. Her brother-in-law, a high ranking Iraqi army officer, sat with us, as did Ahmed my security guy. The brother-in-law did what little talking there was. He described his brother as loyal and strong, dedicated to his family and tribe. Ahmed made a collection from the project staff, and accumulated a wild looking stack of multicolored Iraqi notes and US dollars. We had a goal of giving him his annual salary, $5000, and we succeeded with a little help from the project slush fund. I handed this to the girl without ceremony, and she accepted with but a hint of gratitude.The gesture made much more impact on the officer and the others in the village who came to witness the goings-on. We also offered to pay to finish the house that Saed was building. The brother-in-law officer assured me that the girl will be taken care of, in fact, she will probably become a wife of another brother.
“And on this same day, Paul Bremer got his Presidential Medal of Honor,along with (General Tommy ) Franks and (former CIA chief George) Tenet. Instead of receiving medals they should be the ones attending the funerals and handing over paltry sums to innocent Iraqis. This is why I am so angry. None of this had to happen.”
There is little one can add to this kind of crie de couer. Except to underline my friend’s last sentence: “None of this had to happen.” The list of those who should be held accountable is too long to publish here. But, as Harry Truman famously remarked, “The buck stops here” – which means George W. Bush.
Sunday, December 12, 2004
THE TARNISHED FIGLEAF
By William Fisher
Arab leaders meeting in Morocco for the Freedom Forum of the G-8 industrialized countries told US Secretary State Colin Powell that "their support for reform in the region will go hand-in-hand with their support for a just, comprehensive and lasting settlement to the Arab-Israeli conflict."
Arab League chief Amr Musa echoed the sentiments of all his Arab colleagues when he insisted that Palestinian peace was necessary before the reforms envisioned by the US-proposed Broader Middle East and North Africa initiative could be achieved. He said an independent Palestine "is a must" if the US plan is to have any chance of working. Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud Faisal put it even more bluntly, telling the conference that the perceived US bias towards Israel was the main obstacle to promoting reform in the region.
But what Mr. Musa and his cohorts forgot to explain is the connection between these two propositions. And for good reason: there is no connection.
For three decades, the authoritarian and unelected governments of the Arab Middle East have used the Israeli-Palestinian dispute as a figleaf to conceal their own unwillingness to embrace transparency, accountability and representative governance. And they have done so while giving little save rhetoric to the Palestinian people or to solving their wretched dilemma.
One has to wonder what these leaders will ever do if, by some miracle of diplomacy and geopolitics, a two-state solution should actually happen -- and the figleaf should drop!
Equitable resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian scourge is the desire of all reasonable people. And most of them would agree that US policy is, and is perceived to be, unreasonably pro-Israel. But that merely limits the ability of the United States to function as a truly honest broker. It says nothing about the glacial pace of Arab reform, or of the capacity of the Arab world to accelerate it.
If reform was a real goal among the Arab states, why would they need a US-backed plan in the first place? They already have all the power they need to speed up the process. What they don’t have is the political will and the conviction that reform is what their people deserve.
In a recent article, Rami Khoury, the executive editor of The Daily Star newspaper in Beirut, posed a tantalizing question: What if the roadmap to democratic reform ended up leading not through Baghdad but through Ramallah? What if the Palestinians were able to elect their new president? What if that president were able to rein in their more violent elements? What if the Israelis and the Palestinians then returned to the table and successfully negotiated an end to the bloodshed?
What would the rest of the Arabs do if the State of Palestine became the first Arab democracy to the Middle East? And their last excuse for doing nothing disappeared?
Maybe it’s a longshot, but watch this space!
Arab leaders meeting in Morocco for the Freedom Forum of the G-8 industrialized countries told US Secretary State Colin Powell that "their support for reform in the region will go hand-in-hand with their support for a just, comprehensive and lasting settlement to the Arab-Israeli conflict."
Arab League chief Amr Musa echoed the sentiments of all his Arab colleagues when he insisted that Palestinian peace was necessary before the reforms envisioned by the US-proposed Broader Middle East and North Africa initiative could be achieved. He said an independent Palestine "is a must" if the US plan is to have any chance of working. Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud Faisal put it even more bluntly, telling the conference that the perceived US bias towards Israel was the main obstacle to promoting reform in the region.
But what Mr. Musa and his cohorts forgot to explain is the connection between these two propositions. And for good reason: there is no connection.
For three decades, the authoritarian and unelected governments of the Arab Middle East have used the Israeli-Palestinian dispute as a figleaf to conceal their own unwillingness to embrace transparency, accountability and representative governance. And they have done so while giving little save rhetoric to the Palestinian people or to solving their wretched dilemma.
One has to wonder what these leaders will ever do if, by some miracle of diplomacy and geopolitics, a two-state solution should actually happen -- and the figleaf should drop!
Equitable resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian scourge is the desire of all reasonable people. And most of them would agree that US policy is, and is perceived to be, unreasonably pro-Israel. But that merely limits the ability of the United States to function as a truly honest broker. It says nothing about the glacial pace of Arab reform, or of the capacity of the Arab world to accelerate it.
If reform was a real goal among the Arab states, why would they need a US-backed plan in the first place? They already have all the power they need to speed up the process. What they don’t have is the political will and the conviction that reform is what their people deserve.
In a recent article, Rami Khoury, the executive editor of The Daily Star newspaper in Beirut, posed a tantalizing question: What if the roadmap to democratic reform ended up leading not through Baghdad but through Ramallah? What if the Palestinians were able to elect their new president? What if that president were able to rein in their more violent elements? What if the Israelis and the Palestinians then returned to the table and successfully negotiated an end to the bloodshed?
What would the rest of the Arabs do if the State of Palestine became the first Arab democracy to the Middle East? And their last excuse for doing nothing disappeared?
Maybe it’s a longshot, but watch this space!
Saturday, December 11, 2004
RIGHT HAND, LEFT HAND
By William Fisher
Ellen Goodman of the Boston Globe performs a genuine public service by calling our attention to yet another screw-up in America’s war against the Axis of Evil.
This one can only make us wonder if the government’s right hand knows what its left hand is doing.
Ms. Goodman points out that Shirin Ebadi, the Iranian dissident who is the first Muslim woman to win the Nobel Peace Prize, “is being prevented from publishing her memoirs in the United States because of regulations that prohibit ‘trading with the enemy’." Her book is an effort to "help correct Western stereotypes of Islam, especially the image of Muslim women as docile, forlorn creatures."
But at the same time, the US State Department – which is allegedly in charge of ‘winning the hearts and minds’ of people who live under repressive, authoritarian regimes -- posts on its website a Fact Sheet entitled, “Iran: Voices Struggling To Be Heard.”
And prominent among these ‘Voices’ is – you guessed it -- Shirin Ebadi, who is described as one of Iran’s ‘Voices of Hope’.
It says of her: Shirin Ebadi was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize “for her life-long campaign to protect vulnerable and persecuted groups within Iranian society.” And it quotes the citation from the Norwegian Nobel Committee: “As a lawyer, judge, lecturer, writer and activist, she has spoken out clearly and strongly in her country, Iran and far beyond.”
The State Department goes on to explain, “Since being forced from her position as the president of the city court of Tehran, she has used her legal expertise to promote and protect some of the most basic and necessary human rights…. she has provided legal representation to many activists who are the targets of government harassment because of dissident opinions and democracy promotion. She has courageously fought for equitable and just treatment for women in Iranian society, and she has also helped to organize efforts to publicize and alleviate the harsh conditions of ‘street children’ in Iran.”
The State Department then reminds us that in 2000 Ms. Ebadi “was arrested and accused of distributing a videotape that implicated prominent hard-line leaders of instigating attacks against advocates of reform. She received a suspended sentence and a professional ban. She was then detained after attending a conference in Berlin on the Iranian reform movement.”
It says she also provided legal representation for “highly politicized and sensitive cases” such as the students killed during the 1999 Tehran University protests by vigilante groups operating under the influence of hard-line clerics, and two prominent political activists who were stabbed to death in 1998 by “rogue” elements within the Intelligence Ministry.
Even President Bush lauds Ms. Ebadi. In Iran, he says, “the demand for democracy is strong and broad as we saw when thousands gathered to welcome home Shirin Ebadi, the winner of the Nobel Peace Prize. The regime in Tehran must heed the democratic demands of the Iranian people, or lose its last claim to legitimacy."
Ms. Ebadi herself says, “Any person who pursues human rights in Iran must live with fear from birth to death, but I have learned to overcome my fear.”
But can she overcome US government bureaucracy? The problem with publishing her book in the US, Ms. Goodman writes, is a 1917 law that “allows the president to bar transactions during times of war or national emergency.” The law has been amended to exempt publishers, but the Treasury Department has ruled it illegal “to enhance the value of anything created in Iran without permission” -- including books.
Moreover, as Ms. Goodman points out, if Ms. Ebadi's literary agent were to help prepare the manuscript for an American audience, she too would be subject to punishment -- 10 years in prison and a $250,000 fine for an individual or $1 million for a publishing house.
The Treasury Department suggests that Ms. Ebadi apply for a special
license. But, as Ellen Goodman points out, “no American needs a license to publish a book. Neither this free-speech lawyer nor her supporters are going to ask the government for permission.”
Instead, Ms. Ebadi and her agent are suing the Treasury Department. Which obviously hasn’t yet told the State Department.
Publication of the Ebadi book in the US would be perfectly OK with Treasury if the book were already published in Iran. But the Catch-22 here is that the ayatollahs have already foreclosed this option.
And now an anachronistic US law is having the same effect.
When Ms. Ebadi received her Nobel Prize, Kenneth Roth, the Executive Director of Human Rights Watch, said, “The Nobel Committee has sent a powerful message to the Iranian Government that serious human rights violations must end. We hope they hear that message."
We hope the US government hears it first.
Ellen Goodman of the Boston Globe performs a genuine public service by calling our attention to yet another screw-up in America’s war against the Axis of Evil.
This one can only make us wonder if the government’s right hand knows what its left hand is doing.
Ms. Goodman points out that Shirin Ebadi, the Iranian dissident who is the first Muslim woman to win the Nobel Peace Prize, “is being prevented from publishing her memoirs in the United States because of regulations that prohibit ‘trading with the enemy’." Her book is an effort to "help correct Western stereotypes of Islam, especially the image of Muslim women as docile, forlorn creatures."
But at the same time, the US State Department – which is allegedly in charge of ‘winning the hearts and minds’ of people who live under repressive, authoritarian regimes -- posts on its website a Fact Sheet entitled, “Iran: Voices Struggling To Be Heard.”
And prominent among these ‘Voices’ is – you guessed it -- Shirin Ebadi, who is described as one of Iran’s ‘Voices of Hope’.
It says of her: Shirin Ebadi was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize “for her life-long campaign to protect vulnerable and persecuted groups within Iranian society.” And it quotes the citation from the Norwegian Nobel Committee: “As a lawyer, judge, lecturer, writer and activist, she has spoken out clearly and strongly in her country, Iran and far beyond.”
The State Department goes on to explain, “Since being forced from her position as the president of the city court of Tehran, she has used her legal expertise to promote and protect some of the most basic and necessary human rights…. she has provided legal representation to many activists who are the targets of government harassment because of dissident opinions and democracy promotion. She has courageously fought for equitable and just treatment for women in Iranian society, and she has also helped to organize efforts to publicize and alleviate the harsh conditions of ‘street children’ in Iran.”
The State Department then reminds us that in 2000 Ms. Ebadi “was arrested and accused of distributing a videotape that implicated prominent hard-line leaders of instigating attacks against advocates of reform. She received a suspended sentence and a professional ban. She was then detained after attending a conference in Berlin on the Iranian reform movement.”
It says she also provided legal representation for “highly politicized and sensitive cases” such as the students killed during the 1999 Tehran University protests by vigilante groups operating under the influence of hard-line clerics, and two prominent political activists who were stabbed to death in 1998 by “rogue” elements within the Intelligence Ministry.
Even President Bush lauds Ms. Ebadi. In Iran, he says, “the demand for democracy is strong and broad as we saw when thousands gathered to welcome home Shirin Ebadi, the winner of the Nobel Peace Prize. The regime in Tehran must heed the democratic demands of the Iranian people, or lose its last claim to legitimacy."
Ms. Ebadi herself says, “Any person who pursues human rights in Iran must live with fear from birth to death, but I have learned to overcome my fear.”
But can she overcome US government bureaucracy? The problem with publishing her book in the US, Ms. Goodman writes, is a 1917 law that “allows the president to bar transactions during times of war or national emergency.” The law has been amended to exempt publishers, but the Treasury Department has ruled it illegal “to enhance the value of anything created in Iran without permission” -- including books.
Moreover, as Ms. Goodman points out, if Ms. Ebadi's literary agent were to help prepare the manuscript for an American audience, she too would be subject to punishment -- 10 years in prison and a $250,000 fine for an individual or $1 million for a publishing house.
The Treasury Department suggests that Ms. Ebadi apply for a special
license. But, as Ellen Goodman points out, “no American needs a license to publish a book. Neither this free-speech lawyer nor her supporters are going to ask the government for permission.”
Instead, Ms. Ebadi and her agent are suing the Treasury Department. Which obviously hasn’t yet told the State Department.
Publication of the Ebadi book in the US would be perfectly OK with Treasury if the book were already published in Iran. But the Catch-22 here is that the ayatollahs have already foreclosed this option.
And now an anachronistic US law is having the same effect.
When Ms. Ebadi received her Nobel Prize, Kenneth Roth, the Executive Director of Human Rights Watch, said, “The Nobel Committee has sent a powerful message to the Iranian Government that serious human rights violations must end. We hope they hear that message."
We hope the US government hears it first.
Friday, December 10, 2004
HOW DOES THIS MAKE US MORE SECURE?
By William Fisher
Since 9/11, millions of words have been written about the ‘terrorists in our midst’. Most congratulated US law enforcement for finding and jailing them. Fewer questioned whether the principles of American human rights and civil liberties were being compromised by an over-zealous government gripped by fear.
But both sides of this controversy have usually overlooked something important in this delicate minuet of constitutional protections versus another terrorist attack: the human faces of ‘the other victims’ of 9/11.
In the days and weeks following 9/11, the FBI rounded up and imprisoned thousands of immigrants and visitors to the US. Now, in a new report, the American Civil Liberties Union documents what happened to thirteen of these ‘other victims’ and their families. “Worlds Apart” describes “How Deporting Immigrants After 9/11 Tore Families Apart and Shattered Communities.”
The story of how the US Government responded to 9/11 has been written about extensively, but remains relatively little known. The short version, from the ACLU report, is that the United States “incarcerated petitioners in degrading and inhumane conditions. Although the immigrants generally were detained on non-criminal immigration charges, many were kept in cells for 23 hours a day and were made to wear hand and leg shackles when leaving their cells. Some were kept in solitary confinement for extended periods with no explanation. Lights were left on 24 hours a day, immigrants were denied the use of blankets, and many were denied telephone calls and visits with family members.”
For many, says the ACLU, “the nightmare began with their arrest. FBI and immigration officials dragged some people out of their houses in the middle of the night in front of frightened wives and children. Others were picked up for being in the wrong place”, like the man “arrested by agents who had come looking for his roommate but took him instead. Still others were arrested after routine traffic stops. For many, it would be days before they could contact their families with their whereabouts and weeks before they could access legal help. The government refused to release the names of people it had detained. Behind bars, many suffered from harassment and even physical abuse.”
Conditions in US detention facilities – America’s most secretive prison system – have been chronicled by Mark Dow, a former employee of a detention facility, in his chilling book, “American Gulag”. These facilities were operated by the US Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS), now part of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS).
None of the thousands of people detained by the INS were found guilty of any terrorism-related offense or connected in any way with the September 11 attacks, the ACLU says, adding, “Yet the Justice Department website still boasts that hundreds of immigrants ‘linked to the September 11 investigation’ have been deported.”
The report charges, “the government’s unlawful policies had profound effects not only on the people who were unlawfully imprisoned but also on their families and communities. Families were torn apart. Communities were shattered. And the stories told in this report are just a sample. For each of the stories told in this report, there are hundreds of similar stories that haven’t been told. Children separated from fathers, wives separated from husbands, parents separated from sons.”
The stories of the thirteen deportees, whose stories are chronicled in the new ACLU report, are based on interviews with deportees in Pakistan, arranged with the help of the Pakistan Human Rights Commission.
Their stories vary widely. Says the report: “Some men drove cabs, some delivered pizzas and still others pumped gas. Some spoke Urdu and others Arabic. Some came from tiny villages, others from major, cosmopolitan cities. Some had children who attended public schools, speaking perfect English and playing basketball with American friends. Others supported their families in Pakistan or Jordan, sending money for school fees, home repairs or life-saving medicines. Many had been here for years, others for only a few months.”
But, says the ACLU, “the stories of these men are similar in important ways. All came to the United States seeking a better life for themselves and their families. All were Muslim, from South Asia or the Middle East. After September 11, all were caught in a government dragnet that swept up hundreds of Muslims indiscriminately. And all were denied basic rights normally afforded to those detained in the United States and other democratic countries.”
Many, the report says, “have been deported to countries where they haven’t lived in years, and where unemployment rates are high and salaries are low. Many have been harassed because of their connections to the U.S. or taunted for being deported.”
For example, “Sadek Awaed’s friends in Jersey City, New Jersey stopped speaking to him after the FBI questioned them and suggested that he was involved with terrorists. Asylum-seeker Benamar Benatta, who is still behind bars in New York, worries that the charges will haunt him if he ends up being returned to Algeria. Anser Mehmood’s young sons were threatened and teased in their New Jersey school for having a “terrorist” for a father. Haneen is the 14-year-old U.S.-born daughter of Khaled Abu-Shabayek. Her family moved to Jordan in 2002 after her father was detained and deported. “I can’t take it anymore, and I’m very angry,” she said. “Everyone [in my family], they’re always angry, they’re not happy.” Anza is the nine-year-old daughter of Khurram Altaf. For the first time this year, she will not be able to attend the special school that accommodates her hearing disability — such schools don’t exist in Pakistan, where she moved after her father was deported. “
Their communities in the U.S. were negatively affected, too, the report says. “Neighborhoods that were vibrant and full are suddenly half-empty and quiet. Merchants are struggling; many have been forced out of business. And people are scared that they could be the next to be awakened in the middle of the night by immigration officials.”
The ACLU reports that in January 2004, lawyers filed a petition with the United Nations Working Group on Arbitrary Detention on behalf of the thirteen men who had been detained in the United States, and whose stories are told in the new report. All but one of the petitioners has now been deported.
The petitioners alleged that: “The United States detained petitioners as suspected terrorists even where there was no evidence – let alone credible evidence – that they had engaged in criminal activity of any sort; the United States imprisoned petitioners under a “hold until cleared” policy that effectively imposed a presumption of guilt (under the policy, detainees were held until the FBI decided that they were innocent; compounding the injury, some petitioners were detained even after the FBI had affirmatively cleared them of all charges);the United States’ arbitrary and haphazard arrest and detention policies were directed almost entirely against Muslim men of South Asian or Middle Eastern descent; the United States denied petitioners access to counsel, failed to inform them promptly of the charges against them or to bring them before a judge, and categorically denied them release on bond.”
The UN requested and has received a response to the complaint from the US State Department. It is currently awaiting the UN’s judgment.
The ACLU report concludes: “In the weeks and months after September 11, the people whose stories are told in this report did not count. The United States government arrested them without suspicion, imprisoned them without charge, and abused them without consequence. All of this took place in secret. To this day, the government still refuses to release the names of the people who were imprisoned.”
In a democratic society, the report says, “the government should not be permitted to sweep human beings under the rug, to pretend that they don’t count. The government should not be permitted to make people disappear.”
It adds: “The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, like the United States Declaration of Independence, recognizes that every human being has rights, that every person counts. The United States government correctly condemns other countries when they violate the rights enshrined in the Universal Declaration. We have to be equally vigilant, however, in making sure that those rights are not violated here at home.”
Since 9/11, millions of words have been written about the ‘terrorists in our midst’. Most congratulated US law enforcement for finding and jailing them. Fewer questioned whether the principles of American human rights and civil liberties were being compromised by an over-zealous government gripped by fear.
But both sides of this controversy have usually overlooked something important in this delicate minuet of constitutional protections versus another terrorist attack: the human faces of ‘the other victims’ of 9/11.
In the days and weeks following 9/11, the FBI rounded up and imprisoned thousands of immigrants and visitors to the US. Now, in a new report, the American Civil Liberties Union documents what happened to thirteen of these ‘other victims’ and their families. “Worlds Apart” describes “How Deporting Immigrants After 9/11 Tore Families Apart and Shattered Communities.”
The story of how the US Government responded to 9/11 has been written about extensively, but remains relatively little known. The short version, from the ACLU report, is that the United States “incarcerated petitioners in degrading and inhumane conditions. Although the immigrants generally were detained on non-criminal immigration charges, many were kept in cells for 23 hours a day and were made to wear hand and leg shackles when leaving their cells. Some were kept in solitary confinement for extended periods with no explanation. Lights were left on 24 hours a day, immigrants were denied the use of blankets, and many were denied telephone calls and visits with family members.”
For many, says the ACLU, “the nightmare began with their arrest. FBI and immigration officials dragged some people out of their houses in the middle of the night in front of frightened wives and children. Others were picked up for being in the wrong place”, like the man “arrested by agents who had come looking for his roommate but took him instead. Still others were arrested after routine traffic stops. For many, it would be days before they could contact their families with their whereabouts and weeks before they could access legal help. The government refused to release the names of people it had detained. Behind bars, many suffered from harassment and even physical abuse.”
Conditions in US detention facilities – America’s most secretive prison system – have been chronicled by Mark Dow, a former employee of a detention facility, in his chilling book, “American Gulag”. These facilities were operated by the US Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS), now part of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS).
None of the thousands of people detained by the INS were found guilty of any terrorism-related offense or connected in any way with the September 11 attacks, the ACLU says, adding, “Yet the Justice Department website still boasts that hundreds of immigrants ‘linked to the September 11 investigation’ have been deported.”
The report charges, “the government’s unlawful policies had profound effects not only on the people who were unlawfully imprisoned but also on their families and communities. Families were torn apart. Communities were shattered. And the stories told in this report are just a sample. For each of the stories told in this report, there are hundreds of similar stories that haven’t been told. Children separated from fathers, wives separated from husbands, parents separated from sons.”
The stories of the thirteen deportees, whose stories are chronicled in the new ACLU report, are based on interviews with deportees in Pakistan, arranged with the help of the Pakistan Human Rights Commission.
Their stories vary widely. Says the report: “Some men drove cabs, some delivered pizzas and still others pumped gas. Some spoke Urdu and others Arabic. Some came from tiny villages, others from major, cosmopolitan cities. Some had children who attended public schools, speaking perfect English and playing basketball with American friends. Others supported their families in Pakistan or Jordan, sending money for school fees, home repairs or life-saving medicines. Many had been here for years, others for only a few months.”
But, says the ACLU, “the stories of these men are similar in important ways. All came to the United States seeking a better life for themselves and their families. All were Muslim, from South Asia or the Middle East. After September 11, all were caught in a government dragnet that swept up hundreds of Muslims indiscriminately. And all were denied basic rights normally afforded to those detained in the United States and other democratic countries.”
Many, the report says, “have been deported to countries where they haven’t lived in years, and where unemployment rates are high and salaries are low. Many have been harassed because of their connections to the U.S. or taunted for being deported.”
For example, “Sadek Awaed’s friends in Jersey City, New Jersey stopped speaking to him after the FBI questioned them and suggested that he was involved with terrorists. Asylum-seeker Benamar Benatta, who is still behind bars in New York, worries that the charges will haunt him if he ends up being returned to Algeria. Anser Mehmood’s young sons were threatened and teased in their New Jersey school for having a “terrorist” for a father. Haneen is the 14-year-old U.S.-born daughter of Khaled Abu-Shabayek. Her family moved to Jordan in 2002 after her father was detained and deported. “I can’t take it anymore, and I’m very angry,” she said. “Everyone [in my family], they’re always angry, they’re not happy.” Anza is the nine-year-old daughter of Khurram Altaf. For the first time this year, she will not be able to attend the special school that accommodates her hearing disability — such schools don’t exist in Pakistan, where she moved after her father was deported. “
Their communities in the U.S. were negatively affected, too, the report says. “Neighborhoods that were vibrant and full are suddenly half-empty and quiet. Merchants are struggling; many have been forced out of business. And people are scared that they could be the next to be awakened in the middle of the night by immigration officials.”
The ACLU reports that in January 2004, lawyers filed a petition with the United Nations Working Group on Arbitrary Detention on behalf of the thirteen men who had been detained in the United States, and whose stories are told in the new report. All but one of the petitioners has now been deported.
The petitioners alleged that: “The United States detained petitioners as suspected terrorists even where there was no evidence – let alone credible evidence – that they had engaged in criminal activity of any sort; the United States imprisoned petitioners under a “hold until cleared” policy that effectively imposed a presumption of guilt (under the policy, detainees were held until the FBI decided that they were innocent; compounding the injury, some petitioners were detained even after the FBI had affirmatively cleared them of all charges);the United States’ arbitrary and haphazard arrest and detention policies were directed almost entirely against Muslim men of South Asian or Middle Eastern descent; the United States denied petitioners access to counsel, failed to inform them promptly of the charges against them or to bring them before a judge, and categorically denied them release on bond.”
The UN requested and has received a response to the complaint from the US State Department. It is currently awaiting the UN’s judgment.
The ACLU report concludes: “In the weeks and months after September 11, the people whose stories are told in this report did not count. The United States government arrested them without suspicion, imprisoned them without charge, and abused them without consequence. All of this took place in secret. To this day, the government still refuses to release the names of the people who were imprisoned.”
In a democratic society, the report says, “the government should not be permitted to sweep human beings under the rug, to pretend that they don’t count. The government should not be permitted to make people disappear.”
It adds: “The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, like the United States Declaration of Independence, recognizes that every human being has rights, that every person counts. The United States government correctly condemns other countries when they violate the rights enshrined in the Universal Declaration. We have to be equally vigilant, however, in making sure that those rights are not violated here at home.”
HOW DOES THIS MAKE US MORE SECURE?
By William Fisher
Since 9/11, millions of words have been written about the ‘terrorists in our midst’. Most congratulated US law enforcement for finding and jailing them. Fewer questioned whether the principles of American human rights and civil liberties were being compromised by an over-zealous government gripped by fear.
But both sides of this controversy have usually overlooked something important in this delicate minuet of constitutional protections versus another terrorist attack: the human faces of ‘the other victims’ of 9/11.
In the days and weeks following 9/11, the FBI rounded up and imprisoned thousands of immigrants and visitors to the US. Now, in a new report, the American Civil Liberties Union documents what happened to thirteen of these ‘other victims’ and their families. “Worlds Apart” describes “How Deporting Immigrants After 9/11 Tore Families Apart and Shattered Communities.”
The story of how the US Government responded to 9/11 has been written about extensively, but remains relatively little known. The short version, from the ACLU report, is that the United States “incarcerated petitioners in degrading and inhumane conditions. Although the immigrants generally were detained on non-criminal immigration charges, many were kept in cells for 23 hours a day and were made to wear hand and leg shackles when leaving their cells. Some were kept in solitary confinement for extended periods with no explanation. Lights were left on 24 hours a day, immigrants were denied the use of blankets, and many were denied telephone calls and visits with family members.”
For many, says the ACLU, “the nightmare began with their arrest. FBI and immigration officials dragged some people out of their houses in the middle of the night in front of frightened wives and children. Others were picked up for being in the wrong place”, like the man “arrested by agents who had come looking for his roommate but took him instead. Still others were arrested after routine traffic stops. For many, it would be days before they could contact their families with their whereabouts and weeks before they could access legal help. The government refused to release the names of people it had detained. Behind bars, many suffered from harassment and even physical abuse.”
Conditions in US detention facilities – America’s most secretive prison system – have been chronicled by Mark Dow, a former employee of a detention facility, in his chilling book, “American Gulag”. These facilities were operated by the US Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS), now part of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS).
None of the thousands of people detained by the INS were found guilty of any terrorism-related offense or connected in any way with the September 11 attacks, the ACLU says, adding, “Yet the Justice Department website still boasts that hundreds of immigrants ‘linked to the September 11 investigation’ have been deported.”
The report charges, “the government’s unlawful policies had profound effects not only on the people who were unlawfully imprisoned but also on their families and communities. Families were torn apart. Communities were shattered. And the stories told in this report are just a sample. For each of the stories told in this report, there are hundreds of similar stories that haven’t been told. Children separated from fathers, wives separated from husbands, parents separated from sons.”
The stories of the thirteen deportees, whose stories are chronicled in the new ACLU report, are based on interviews with the deportees in Pakistan, arranged with the help of the Pakistan Human Rights Commission.
Their stories vary widely. Says the report: “Some men drove cabs, some delivered pizzas and still others pumped gas. Some spoke Urdu and others Arabic. Some came from tiny villages, others from major, cosmopolitan cities. Some had children who attended public schools, speaking perfect English and playing basketball with American friends. Others supported their families in Pakistan or Jordan, sending money for school fees, home repairs or life-saving medicines. Many had been here for years, others for only a few months.”
But, says the ACLU, “the stories of these men are similar in important ways. All came to the United States seeking a better life for themselves and their families. All were Muslim, from South Asia or the Middle East. After September 11, all were caught in a government dragnet that swept up hundreds of Muslims indiscriminately. And all were denied basic rights normally afforded to those detained in the United States and other democratic countries.”
Many, the report says, “have been deported to countries where they haven’t lived in years, and where unemployment rates are high and salaries are low. Many have been harassed because of their connections to the U.S. or taunted for being deported.”
For example, “Sadek Awaed’s friends in Jersey City, New Jersey stopped speaking to him after the FBI questioned them and suggested that he was involved with terrorists. Asylum-seeker Benamar Benatta, who is still behind bars in New York, worries that the charges will haunt him if he ends up being returned to Algeria. Anser Mehmood’s young sons were threatened and teased in their New Jersey school for having a “terrorist” for a father. Haneen is the 14-year-old U.S.-born daughter of Khaled Abu-Shabayek. Her family moved to Jordan in 2002 after her father was detained and deported. “I can’t take it anymore, and I’m very angry,” she said. “Everyone [in my family], they’re always angry, they’re not happy.” Anza is the nine-year-old daughter of Khurram Altaf. For the first time this year, she will not be able to attend the special school that accommodates her hearing disability — such schools don’t exist in Pakistan, where she moved after her father was deported. “
Their communities in the U.S. were negatively affected, too, the report says. “Neighborhoods that were vibrant and full are suddenly half-empty and quiet. Merchants are struggling; many have been forced out of business. And people are scared that they could be the next to be awakened in the middle of the night by immigration officials.”
The ACLU reports that in January 2004, lawyers filed a petition with the United Nations Working Group on Arbitrary Detention on behalf of the thirteen men who had been detained in the United States, and whose stories are told in the new report. All but one of the petitioners has now been deported.
The petitioners alleged that: “The United States detained petitioners as suspected terrorists even where there was no evidence – let alone credible evidence – that they had engaged in criminal activity of any sort; the United States imprisoned petitioners under a “hold until cleared” policy that effectively imposed a presumption of guilt (under the policy, detainees were held until the FBI decided that they were innocent; compounding the injury, some petitioners were detained even after the FBI had affirmatively cleared them of all charges);the United States’ arbitrary and haphazard arrest and detention policies were directed almost entirely against Muslim men of South Asian or Middle Eastern descent; the United States denied petitioners access to counsel, failed to inform them promptly of the charges against them or to bring them before a judge, and categorically denied them release on bond.”
The UN requested and has received a response to the complaint from the US State Department. It is currently awaiting the UN’s judgment.
The ACLU report concludes: “In the weeks and months after September 11, the people whose stories are told in this report did not count. The United States government arrested them without suspicion, imprisoned them without charge, and abused them without consequence. All of this took place in secret. To this day, the government still refuses to release the names of the people who were imprisoned.”
In a democratic society, the report says, “the government should not be permitted to sweep human beings under the rug, to pretend that they don’t count. The government should not be permitted to make people disappear.”
It adds: “The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, like the United States Declaration of Independence, recognizes that every human being has rights, that every person counts. The United States government correctly condemns other countries when they violate the rights enshrined in the Universal Declaration. We have to be equally vigilant, however, in making sure that those rights are not violated here at home.”
Since 9/11, millions of words have been written about the ‘terrorists in our midst’. Most congratulated US law enforcement for finding and jailing them. Fewer questioned whether the principles of American human rights and civil liberties were being compromised by an over-zealous government gripped by fear.
But both sides of this controversy have usually overlooked something important in this delicate minuet of constitutional protections versus another terrorist attack: the human faces of ‘the other victims’ of 9/11.
In the days and weeks following 9/11, the FBI rounded up and imprisoned thousands of immigrants and visitors to the US. Now, in a new report, the American Civil Liberties Union documents what happened to thirteen of these ‘other victims’ and their families. “Worlds Apart” describes “How Deporting Immigrants After 9/11 Tore Families Apart and Shattered Communities.”
The story of how the US Government responded to 9/11 has been written about extensively, but remains relatively little known. The short version, from the ACLU report, is that the United States “incarcerated petitioners in degrading and inhumane conditions. Although the immigrants generally were detained on non-criminal immigration charges, many were kept in cells for 23 hours a day and were made to wear hand and leg shackles when leaving their cells. Some were kept in solitary confinement for extended periods with no explanation. Lights were left on 24 hours a day, immigrants were denied the use of blankets, and many were denied telephone calls and visits with family members.”
For many, says the ACLU, “the nightmare began with their arrest. FBI and immigration officials dragged some people out of their houses in the middle of the night in front of frightened wives and children. Others were picked up for being in the wrong place”, like the man “arrested by agents who had come looking for his roommate but took him instead. Still others were arrested after routine traffic stops. For many, it would be days before they could contact their families with their whereabouts and weeks before they could access legal help. The government refused to release the names of people it had detained. Behind bars, many suffered from harassment and even physical abuse.”
Conditions in US detention facilities – America’s most secretive prison system – have been chronicled by Mark Dow, a former employee of a detention facility, in his chilling book, “American Gulag”. These facilities were operated by the US Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS), now part of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS).
None of the thousands of people detained by the INS were found guilty of any terrorism-related offense or connected in any way with the September 11 attacks, the ACLU says, adding, “Yet the Justice Department website still boasts that hundreds of immigrants ‘linked to the September 11 investigation’ have been deported.”
The report charges, “the government’s unlawful policies had profound effects not only on the people who were unlawfully imprisoned but also on their families and communities. Families were torn apart. Communities were shattered. And the stories told in this report are just a sample. For each of the stories told in this report, there are hundreds of similar stories that haven’t been told. Children separated from fathers, wives separated from husbands, parents separated from sons.”
The stories of the thirteen deportees, whose stories are chronicled in the new ACLU report, are based on interviews with the deportees in Pakistan, arranged with the help of the Pakistan Human Rights Commission.
Their stories vary widely. Says the report: “Some men drove cabs, some delivered pizzas and still others pumped gas. Some spoke Urdu and others Arabic. Some came from tiny villages, others from major, cosmopolitan cities. Some had children who attended public schools, speaking perfect English and playing basketball with American friends. Others supported their families in Pakistan or Jordan, sending money for school fees, home repairs or life-saving medicines. Many had been here for years, others for only a few months.”
But, says the ACLU, “the stories of these men are similar in important ways. All came to the United States seeking a better life for themselves and their families. All were Muslim, from South Asia or the Middle East. After September 11, all were caught in a government dragnet that swept up hundreds of Muslims indiscriminately. And all were denied basic rights normally afforded to those detained in the United States and other democratic countries.”
Many, the report says, “have been deported to countries where they haven’t lived in years, and where unemployment rates are high and salaries are low. Many have been harassed because of their connections to the U.S. or taunted for being deported.”
For example, “Sadek Awaed’s friends in Jersey City, New Jersey stopped speaking to him after the FBI questioned them and suggested that he was involved with terrorists. Asylum-seeker Benamar Benatta, who is still behind bars in New York, worries that the charges will haunt him if he ends up being returned to Algeria. Anser Mehmood’s young sons were threatened and teased in their New Jersey school for having a “terrorist” for a father. Haneen is the 14-year-old U.S.-born daughter of Khaled Abu-Shabayek. Her family moved to Jordan in 2002 after her father was detained and deported. “I can’t take it anymore, and I’m very angry,” she said. “Everyone [in my family], they’re always angry, they’re not happy.” Anza is the nine-year-old daughter of Khurram Altaf. For the first time this year, she will not be able to attend the special school that accommodates her hearing disability — such schools don’t exist in Pakistan, where she moved after her father was deported. “
Their communities in the U.S. were negatively affected, too, the report says. “Neighborhoods that were vibrant and full are suddenly half-empty and quiet. Merchants are struggling; many have been forced out of business. And people are scared that they could be the next to be awakened in the middle of the night by immigration officials.”
The ACLU reports that in January 2004, lawyers filed a petition with the United Nations Working Group on Arbitrary Detention on behalf of the thirteen men who had been detained in the United States, and whose stories are told in the new report. All but one of the petitioners has now been deported.
The petitioners alleged that: “The United States detained petitioners as suspected terrorists even where there was no evidence – let alone credible evidence – that they had engaged in criminal activity of any sort; the United States imprisoned petitioners under a “hold until cleared” policy that effectively imposed a presumption of guilt (under the policy, detainees were held until the FBI decided that they were innocent; compounding the injury, some petitioners were detained even after the FBI had affirmatively cleared them of all charges);the United States’ arbitrary and haphazard arrest and detention policies were directed almost entirely against Muslim men of South Asian or Middle Eastern descent; the United States denied petitioners access to counsel, failed to inform them promptly of the charges against them or to bring them before a judge, and categorically denied them release on bond.”
The UN requested and has received a response to the complaint from the US State Department. It is currently awaiting the UN’s judgment.
The ACLU report concludes: “In the weeks and months after September 11, the people whose stories are told in this report did not count. The United States government arrested them without suspicion, imprisoned them without charge, and abused them without consequence. All of this took place in secret. To this day, the government still refuses to release the names of the people who were imprisoned.”
In a democratic society, the report says, “the government should not be permitted to sweep human beings under the rug, to pretend that they don’t count. The government should not be permitted to make people disappear.”
It adds: “The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, like the United States Declaration of Independence, recognizes that every human being has rights, that every person counts. The United States government correctly condemns other countries when they violate the rights enshrined in the Universal Declaration. We have to be equally vigilant, however, in making sure that those rights are not violated here at home.”
CIVIL RIGHTS AND INTELLIGENCE REFORM
By William Fisher
Many of the more draconian provisions adversely affecting privacy, secrecy and the rights of asylum-seekers, originally included in the “Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004”, were omitted in the final version of the law. But the compromise agreed to by the US House of Representatives and Senate continues to contain language that troubles human and civil rights organizations.
For example, the House version of the bill would have allowed non-citizens -- including those likely to face torture if returned to their home countries -- to be deported without an immigration court hearing, made it much more difficult for genuine refugees to prove their asylum cases, and deprived judicial review to victims of torture and other forms of persecution.
This and similar provisions were removed under pressure from the White House, leaders of both political parties, the families of the victims of the September 11, 2001 attacks, and members of the 9/11 Commission, on whose recommendations the intelligence overhaul is based.
“These provisions would have put the lives of refugees at real risk,” said a statement from Human Rights First, an advocacy group. “The fact that they were dropped is a victory for America’s commitment to protecting the persecuted”, the organization said.
Under US law, both House and Senate must pass legislation separately. If the two versions contain disagreements, they are reconciled in a House-Senate Conference Committee. The 9/11 Commission did not recommend changes in US immigration law, and most observers found the Senate version much closer to the Commission’s recommendations. Removal of the House’s immigration language, as well as other provisions, allowed both legislative bodies to pass a compromise bill for the president’s signature.
While the harshest refugee and immigration proposals were dropped from the final version, the bill now passed by both houses of congress includes a requirement that the General Accounting Office (GAO), Congress’ investigative arm, conduct a study and report, “to evaluate the extent to which weaknesses in the United States asylum system and withholding of removal system have been or could be exploited by aliens connected to, charged in connection with, or tied to terrorist activity.”
Under the new measure, people indicted on terror charges will find it much more difficult to gain their freedom on bail. A legal presumption would be established denying bail for anyone indicted by a grand jury on terrorism charges. Although the suspect could appeal to a judge, the burden of proof would be on the defendant rather than on the government.
Previously, that stipulation applied to suspects in violent and drug crimes, but not to alleged terrorists. Skeptics say the provision has the potential to be abused, possibly resulting in long detentions for people ultimately found innocent.
According to the Associated Press (AP), Sen. Russell Feingold, a democrat from the state of Wisconsin, claims the current Justice Department “has a record of abusing its detention powers post-9/11 and of making terrorism allegations that turn out to have no merit."
The new legislation also expands the FBI's ability to obtain eavesdropping warrants under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA). Under current law, these secret warrants are reserved for non-U.S. citizens who the government can show are affiliated with a foreign power or international terrorist group, such as al-Qaida. But the Department of Justice (DOJ), to which the FBI reports, has made it known that they would favor a “USA Patriot Act II” to expand their powers even further. Both Republican and Democratic civil libertarians have opposed such expansion.
The current USA Patriot Act, hurriedly passed by Congress weeks after the 9/11 attacks, gave the government broad powers to conduct secret searches, wiretaps, and other forms of surveillance. Sections of it are scheduled to expire in 2005, and there has been heated debate about whether they should be extended.
The new intelligence legislation also broadens prohibitions against providing material support to terror groups, makes it a crime to visit a terror camp that provides military-style training and allows the FBI to obtain secret surveillance warrants against "lone wolf" extremists not known to be tied to a specific terrorist group. It also makes terrorism hoaxes a federal crime and toughens penalties against people who possess weapons of mass destruction.
"Overall, it's another threat to civil liberties in this country," a spokesman for the American Civil Liberties Union told the AP. "It's just a continuation of what the administration's been doing."
The final bill also presents problems relating to government secrecy policy. For example, the Senate version of the bill authorizes disclosure of the gross amount of the nation’s intelligence budget – reportedly now about $40 billion annually. However, this disclosure was rejected by House negotiators, despite the unanimous recommendation of the 9/11 Commission and the endorsement of the full Senate.
According to the Government Secrecy Project of the Federation of American Scientists (FAS), this “is a setback that tends to reinforce the arbitrary and excessive secrecy that the 9/11Commission found in the intelligence bureaucracy.”
FAS adds: “Perhaps the most important secrecy-related feature of the
Intelligence Reform Act is what is not in it: the authority to create an entirely autonomous new classification system for intelligence.” It notes that the Act ”revivifies the dormant Public Interest Declassification Board, formally established four years ago but never convened, and assigns it the additional task of ‘reviewing’ congressional requests for declassification of particular records.”
During the Bush Administration, the numbers of documents designated as ‘classified’ have increased dramatically, triggering a corresponding increase in the numbers of requests for information under the government’s Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). The FOIA was signed by President Lyndon B. Johnson in 1968, and was designed to increase public access to government documents.
FAS notes that the final bill “does not expand authority under which information is classified…but rather directs the (new) National Intelligence Director (NID) to establish and implement guidelines for the intelligence community for the purpose of such classification of information."
Human rights advocates are also concerned about what the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), a Washington-based advocacy group, calls the “fundamental tension between intelligence gathering and civil liberties”.
Said a statement from the ACLU: “Where government is focused on gathering intelligence information not connected to specific criminal activity, there is a substantial risk of chilling lawful dissent. Such inquiries plainly have a chilling effect on constitutional rights.” It called for “specific safeguards for domestic collection of intelligence information that preserve the role of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) while ensuring against the use of spy tactics against Americans through strengthened guidelines and other checks and balances to bar political spying.”
Civil liberties advocacy groups have been sharply critical of the FBI
and immigration officials in the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) for detaining thousands of visitors to the US for immigration violations without access to legal counsel or appeal. The DHS is in charge of America’s immigration prison system, from which many have of these detainees have been deported. Since the 9/11 attacks, the FBI has rounded up and detained several thousand US citizens and visitors – most of them Arabs or Muslims. However, no one has yet been convicted of a terror-related charge.
Human rights organizations are also troubled by the mechanism the new law sets up to protect civil rights. While it establishes a Privacy and Civil Liberties Board to review federal policies and practices, it gives the president the authority to appoint its members and denies it subpoena power. The FAS says that while the Board will have little independent authority, it “may turn out to serve as a useful forum for adjudicating classification disputes.”
The final version of the legislation stripped out a provision creating an Inspector General position in the office of the National Intelligence Director. Inspectors-General typically conduct independent investigations of abuses within government departments. They are present in virtually all major departments, including the DOJ, the DHS, and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).
Other provisions of the new law criminalize giving material support to suspected terrorists and provide new investigative authority to pursue "lone wolf" terror suspects not affiliated with other known groups or foreign powers; require extensive sharing of intelligence and law enforcement information among federal, state, local and private entities; directs the DHS to develop a national strategy for transportation security, and adds at least 2,000 Border Patrol agents and 800 customs agents each year for five years and 8,000 beds a year to house immigration detainees and people suspected of terrorism.
Supporters of stricter laws governing US immigration reform and border protection have promised a comprehensive debate in the new Congress, which convenes in January. The border protection and immigration issues have been championed by Representative James A. Sensenbrenner, a Republican from the state of Wisconsin, who is the powerful chairman of the House of Representatives Judiciary Committee. Rep. Sensenbrenner is responsible much of the anti-refugee language in the House version of the bill.
For this reason, few government-watchers expect the controversy over intelligence reform to end with the passage of the new law. As noted by Howard Fineman in Newsweek magazine, “The intraparty battle between the Bush White House and recalcitrant House Republicans over intelligence reform is just the overture to the opera, a discordant melody we're going to hear over and over again during the next two years.”
Many of the more draconian provisions adversely affecting privacy, secrecy and the rights of asylum-seekers, originally included in the “Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004”, were omitted in the final version of the law. But the compromise agreed to by the US House of Representatives and Senate continues to contain language that troubles human and civil rights organizations.
For example, the House version of the bill would have allowed non-citizens -- including those likely to face torture if returned to their home countries -- to be deported without an immigration court hearing, made it much more difficult for genuine refugees to prove their asylum cases, and deprived judicial review to victims of torture and other forms of persecution.
This and similar provisions were removed under pressure from the White House, leaders of both political parties, the families of the victims of the September 11, 2001 attacks, and members of the 9/11 Commission, on whose recommendations the intelligence overhaul is based.
“These provisions would have put the lives of refugees at real risk,” said a statement from Human Rights First, an advocacy group. “The fact that they were dropped is a victory for America’s commitment to protecting the persecuted”, the organization said.
Under US law, both House and Senate must pass legislation separately. If the two versions contain disagreements, they are reconciled in a House-Senate Conference Committee. The 9/11 Commission did not recommend changes in US immigration law, and most observers found the Senate version much closer to the Commission’s recommendations. Removal of the House’s immigration language, as well as other provisions, allowed both legislative bodies to pass a compromise bill for the president’s signature.
While the harshest refugee and immigration proposals were dropped from the final version, the bill now passed by both houses of congress includes a requirement that the General Accounting Office (GAO), Congress’ investigative arm, conduct a study and report, “to evaluate the extent to which weaknesses in the United States asylum system and withholding of removal system have been or could be exploited by aliens connected to, charged in connection with, or tied to terrorist activity.”
Under the new measure, people indicted on terror charges will find it much more difficult to gain their freedom on bail. A legal presumption would be established denying bail for anyone indicted by a grand jury on terrorism charges. Although the suspect could appeal to a judge, the burden of proof would be on the defendant rather than on the government.
Previously, that stipulation applied to suspects in violent and drug crimes, but not to alleged terrorists. Skeptics say the provision has the potential to be abused, possibly resulting in long detentions for people ultimately found innocent.
According to the Associated Press (AP), Sen. Russell Feingold, a democrat from the state of Wisconsin, claims the current Justice Department “has a record of abusing its detention powers post-9/11 and of making terrorism allegations that turn out to have no merit."
The new legislation also expands the FBI's ability to obtain eavesdropping warrants under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA). Under current law, these secret warrants are reserved for non-U.S. citizens who the government can show are affiliated with a foreign power or international terrorist group, such as al-Qaida. But the Department of Justice (DOJ), to which the FBI reports, has made it known that they would favor a “USA Patriot Act II” to expand their powers even further. Both Republican and Democratic civil libertarians have opposed such expansion.
The current USA Patriot Act, hurriedly passed by Congress weeks after the 9/11 attacks, gave the government broad powers to conduct secret searches, wiretaps, and other forms of surveillance. Sections of it are scheduled to expire in 2005, and there has been heated debate about whether they should be extended.
The new intelligence legislation also broadens prohibitions against providing material support to terror groups, makes it a crime to visit a terror camp that provides military-style training and allows the FBI to obtain secret surveillance warrants against "lone wolf" extremists not known to be tied to a specific terrorist group. It also makes terrorism hoaxes a federal crime and toughens penalties against people who possess weapons of mass destruction.
"Overall, it's another threat to civil liberties in this country," a spokesman for the American Civil Liberties Union told the AP. "It's just a continuation of what the administration's been doing."
The final bill also presents problems relating to government secrecy policy. For example, the Senate version of the bill authorizes disclosure of the gross amount of the nation’s intelligence budget – reportedly now about $40 billion annually. However, this disclosure was rejected by House negotiators, despite the unanimous recommendation of the 9/11 Commission and the endorsement of the full Senate.
According to the Government Secrecy Project of the Federation of American Scientists (FAS), this “is a setback that tends to reinforce the arbitrary and excessive secrecy that the 9/11Commission found in the intelligence bureaucracy.”
FAS adds: “Perhaps the most important secrecy-related feature of the
Intelligence Reform Act is what is not in it: the authority to create an entirely autonomous new classification system for intelligence.” It notes that the Act ”revivifies the dormant Public Interest Declassification Board, formally established four years ago but never convened, and assigns it the additional task of ‘reviewing’ congressional requests for declassification of particular records.”
During the Bush Administration, the numbers of documents designated as ‘classified’ have increased dramatically, triggering a corresponding increase in the numbers of requests for information under the government’s Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). The FOIA was signed by President Lyndon B. Johnson in 1968, and was designed to increase public access to government documents.
FAS notes that the final bill “does not expand authority under which information is classified…but rather directs the (new) National Intelligence Director (NID) to establish and implement guidelines for the intelligence community for the purpose of such classification of information."
Human rights advocates are also concerned about what the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), a Washington-based advocacy group, calls the “fundamental tension between intelligence gathering and civil liberties”.
Said a statement from the ACLU: “Where government is focused on gathering intelligence information not connected to specific criminal activity, there is a substantial risk of chilling lawful dissent. Such inquiries plainly have a chilling effect on constitutional rights.” It called for “specific safeguards for domestic collection of intelligence information that preserve the role of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) while ensuring against the use of spy tactics against Americans through strengthened guidelines and other checks and balances to bar political spying.”
Civil liberties advocacy groups have been sharply critical of the FBI
and immigration officials in the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) for detaining thousands of visitors to the US for immigration violations without access to legal counsel or appeal. The DHS is in charge of America’s immigration prison system, from which many have of these detainees have been deported. Since the 9/11 attacks, the FBI has rounded up and detained several thousand US citizens and visitors – most of them Arabs or Muslims. However, no one has yet been convicted of a terror-related charge.
Human rights organizations are also troubled by the mechanism the new law sets up to protect civil rights. While it establishes a Privacy and Civil Liberties Board to review federal policies and practices, it gives the president the authority to appoint its members and denies it subpoena power. The FAS says that while the Board will have little independent authority, it “may turn out to serve as a useful forum for adjudicating classification disputes.”
The final version of the legislation stripped out a provision creating an Inspector General position in the office of the National Intelligence Director. Inspectors-General typically conduct independent investigations of abuses within government departments. They are present in virtually all major departments, including the DOJ, the DHS, and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).
Other provisions of the new law criminalize giving material support to suspected terrorists and provide new investigative authority to pursue "lone wolf" terror suspects not affiliated with other known groups or foreign powers; require extensive sharing of intelligence and law enforcement information among federal, state, local and private entities; directs the DHS to develop a national strategy for transportation security, and adds at least 2,000 Border Patrol agents and 800 customs agents each year for five years and 8,000 beds a year to house immigration detainees and people suspected of terrorism.
Supporters of stricter laws governing US immigration reform and border protection have promised a comprehensive debate in the new Congress, which convenes in January. The border protection and immigration issues have been championed by Representative James A. Sensenbrenner, a Republican from the state of Wisconsin, who is the powerful chairman of the House of Representatives Judiciary Committee. Rep. Sensenbrenner is responsible much of the anti-refugee language in the House version of the bill.
For this reason, few government-watchers expect the controversy over intelligence reform to end with the passage of the new law. As noted by Howard Fineman in Newsweek magazine, “The intraparty battle between the Bush White House and recalcitrant House Republicans over intelligence reform is just the overture to the opera, a discordant melody we're going to hear over and over again during the next two years.”
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
